At Least There Was Good Food....

In the wake of last night's depressing outcome, the one thing I will be focusing on is the delicious food Nick and I spent the day preparing.  One of the fun reasons to have some friends over for the Super Bowl is the excuse to prepare some dishes you probably would not otherwise prepare!  So, for the past two weeks I was trolling the internet looking for some inspiration dishes and came up with the following (forgive my Instagram obsession)...

First up was a Cheesey Pepperoni Pull Apart Bread that I adapted from Jen's Cheesey Mushroom Bread, as I have a friend who is not a mushroom fan.  This recipe was easy to pull together and very satisfying to put on the table with the "ooo's" and "ahh's" it received.  With its adaptability to almost anything this will quickly become a go-to appetizer.

Cheesey Pepperoni Pull Apart Bread

Next up was Megan's Buffalo Chicken Stromboli, adapted to add a lot more heat!  I doubled the amount of Frank's Red Hot and allowed the shredded chicken to sit in all of the sauce not taken up during the sauteing to make sure all the chicken was sufficiently ready to burn tongues!  If that were not enough, I picked up this great buffalo Cheddar at Whole Foods that even had bits of jalapenos added to it!  Needless to say the Stromboli had plenty of bite - good thing we had friends over who love spice as much as Nick and I do.

Buffalo Chicken Stromboli

Nick whipped up some Cake Batter Rice Krispy Treats that I had seen floating around on Pinterest, however, I am not sure the extra cake batter made enough of a difference.  Maybe the sprinkles would have made the difference.

I decided to also go ahead and make Joanne Chang's Milky Way Tart from her Flour Cookbook.  I will do a more detailed post on this later, but lets put it this way (spoiler alert!) - the tart was everyone's favorite dish.

Milky Way Tart

I can't say there was much to celebrate at the end of the night for us Pats fans, but at least the food was good and good company....

Honey Yeast Rolls

I took my roll of being in charge of bread very seriously for Thanksgiving!  In addition to the hazelnut and cranberry bread for pre-dinner, I wanted to do something from scratch for the main meal.  I thought about making the no knead bread because it always comes out well, but I wanted to try something different and something that would feed a few more people!  Thanksgiving dinner cries out for loads of bread for dipping in gravy.  I consulted a few bloggers for a reliable recipe and decided that honey yeast dinner rolls from Beantown Baker were the best way to go.

Dinner Rolls!

The recipe as stated (and below) makes 12 rolls, but I wanted there to be plenty of rolls and doubled the recipe.

The Ingredients

The Necessities...(recipe from Beantown Baker)

• 2 1/4 tsp instant yeast
• 1 cup warm tap water
• 1/4 cup honey
• 3 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 1 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 egg, lightly beaten
• 4 cups bread flour (everyone I spoke to said I should use King Arthur Flour)
• Cooking spray
• 1 tablespoon butter, melted
• 1 tablespoon honey

To begin, I broke out the Kitchen Aid stand mixer and stirred the yeast and warm water with the paddle attachment.  I then added the egg, honey, oil, and mixed it up well.

Wet Ingredients

Once combined, I slowly added three cups of the bread flour and mixed it up until it was a nice and sticky mess.  I added the last cup of flour when the mixer was moving along nice and slowly.

Sticky Dough

Once the flour was fully incorporated into the dough, I changed out the paddle mixer for the dough hook.  I allowed the dough to mix away for about 10 minutes with the dough hook until it was nice and smooth - if you pull on the dough you want it to be elastic.

With the Dough Hook

Once the dough was ready I formed it into a ball and placed it into a mixing bowl with some oil in the bottom and proceeded to spin the ball of dough around in the oil so it was completely covered.

Oily Dough

I covered the bowl with a damp towel and let the dough rest for a bit over 2 hours.  I then kneaded the dough on the floured countertop for about 30 seconds, covered the dough up again with a damp cloth and let it sit for another 10 minutes.

Kneading the Dough

After the ten minutes had past, I punch the dough (fun!)...

Punched Dough

and then pulled the dough apart into 12 even sized pieces.

Dough Balls

I attempted the shape each of the dough balls into round balls and placed it in a greased baking dish.  As you can see, I did not really do a good job of ball forming.

Almost ready for the oven...

After the dough was put in the baking dish I let it all sit covered up by the damp cloth for another 20 minutes.  In the last 5 minutes, I combined the melted butter and the honey and brushed it over the tops.  Finally, the rolls were ready for the oven!  I put the baking dish in the 400 degree oven for about 13 minutes until the tops were nice and golden.

Golden Brown Rolls

I actually cooked these the day before Thanksgiving and once the rolls were completely cooled I covered the dish in saran wrap so it would be ready to go the next morning to be transported to the North Shore.

Delicious!

These rolls were DELICIOUS and a big hit!  23 rolls were completely gone after Thanksgiving dinner - I say 23 rolls because, of course, Nick and I had to taste one to make sure it was good enough to serve the next day (quality control is very important in our eyes)!  These rolls were light and tasty.  The honey flavor was the perfect addition to these rolls and dressed them up a bit.

As my first dinner roll attempt I was completely satisfied, and they were not too difficult to put together (although I obviously struggled making a nice round roll!).  I would totally recommend these for just about any dinner.

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Hazelnut/Pecan and Cranberry Bread

This Thanksgiving was pretty low key for us - only 8 gathered around the table.  While my brother did not make it up for the holiday (paying his dues so he gets Christmas through New Year's off), we were joined by my cousin and her family from Minnesota!  They unfortunately cannot make it to the wedding, but generously offered to come out to Boston for a visit - I mean, they had to meet Nick!  With only 8, my mom had the majority of dinner under control, but still wanting to contribute something to the meal I volunteered myself for the breads.  I figured the possibilities were endless!

Cranberry Hazelnut and Pecan Bread

I remembered a bread recipe that sounded delicious I had seen somewhere with hazelnuts and cranberries.  Knowing we had a bunch of frozen cranberries from our CSA and a bunch of hazelnuts on hand, I was on a mission to find the recipe.  Luckily Nick came to the rescue and did a quick online search and found the recipe on Real Simple's website.

The Ingredients

The Necessities...(adapted from Real Simple)

• 1 cup 
• hazelnuts
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, spooned and leveled
• 1/3 cup granulated sugar
• 1/4 cup packed light brown sugar
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/2 cup whole milk
• 2 large eggs
• 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cups cranberries

To begin, I spread the hazelnuts out on a baking sheet.  Only at this point did I realize I did not in fact have the cup on hand that I thought I had.  So off to the store I went.  However, it turns out there was a run on hazelnuts and neither Savenor's nor the Charles Street Market had any left, and since there's no true substitute for hazelnuts, I decided to buy some pecans to add to the bread instead.  To prepare the nuts, I let them roast in the oven at 350 degrees for about 10 minutes.  Once fragrant, I then removed the skins from the nuts (a little harder than I thought!) and coarsely chopped them up.

Meanwhile, I combined the dry ingredients and set aside for later.  In a separate bowl, I whisked together the melted butter, eggs, vanilla and milk.

Wet Ingredients

Once all whisked together, I slowly added the dry ingredients into the wet.

Adding the dry...

All Combined

At this point the batter was all ready, so I folded in the cranberries, which had thawed out nicely...

Cranberries...

as well as the chopped hazelnut and pecan combination.

get folding...

I gently combined all the ingredients so the cranberries and the nuts were evenly distributed throughout the batter.

Finished Batter

I then poured the batter into a greased bread pan and put it in a 350 degree oven for about 55 minutes until the toothpick came out clean.  To sweeten it up a bit I sprinkled the top with some white sugar, which created a great crust to the bread.

Ready for the Oven

This bread was really easy to put together (once I had the nuts!) and was something I could do ahead of time.  I merely wrapped it up tightly in Saran wrap after it completely cooled.  We sliced and served this bread during appetizers and it provided the perfect transition from breakfast treats into the Thanksgiving feast we were looking forward to!  The combination of the crunch of the nuts and the tartness of the cranberries was delicious and offset the sweetness of the bread perfectly.

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Banana Muffins - my over-ripe banana go-to

I love bananas, but the minute they get too yellow with brown spots I am over them.  For some reason I used to think that banana bread or muffins or some other recipe to use up over-ripe bananas would just be too difficult.  A while ago I decided to stop being wasteful and give the baking ago - turns out, its pretty simple!

Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins

I decided to go with the Joy of Cooking's "Easy Quick Banana Bread" recipe.  My copy of the Joy of Cooking is actually my mom's from the 70's that I "borrowed" for a pie crust recipe a few years back and kept because it is a great resource for newbie cooks like me.

The Ingredients

The Necessities...

• 1 3/4 cups sifted all purpose flour
• 2 1/4 baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/3 cup shortening
• 2/3 cup sugar
• 3/4 teaspoon grated lemon rind
• 1 to 2 eggs
• 1 to 1 1/4 cup banana pulp - about 3 bananas

Old School Joy of Cooking - thanks mom!

First I blended together the flour, baking powder and the salt and set aside. 

Dry Ingredients

Next I mixed the shortening, lemon rind and sugar together until it was creamy - this is where that electric hand mixer I registered for would come in handy!

First "wet" ingredients

After the shortening was nice and creamy, I added the eggs - only 1 because the consistency seemed good to me, and I thought one more would have made the batter too wet.

Pre-Banana

After I mashed the three bananas up in a bowl with a fork, I added it to the bowl as well and mixed it together.

Bananas added

Since I had some chocolate chips left over in the cupboard, I decided to mix those into the batter as well.  You could also add some dried fruit or nuts if you want a bit of a different texture.  The wet mix was then mixed with the dry.

Ready for the pan

I know that the recipe was for bread, but I think muffins are a much better size, and it's easy to freeze a bunch for later - for instances like when guests come over and I need something quickly, or I am just being lazy ("guests coming over" sounds better though!)  I added about a tablespoon of batter to each greased mini muffin slot. 

Ready for the oven

Once the muffin pan was all filled, I placed it in a 350 degree oven for about 28 minutes - probably could have used a little less, but I was winging it because the recipe was for the bread, which had a baking time of almost an hour.

Ready to be eaten!

These were definitely a tasty treat for a Sunday morning when we did not feel like going out but wanted a special treat.  There were also plenty left over to store in the freezer for safe keeping.  While I have not studied the difference between a bread and muffin recipe, this bread recipe worked very well in a muffin tin, and I cannot wait to dig the extras out of the freezer!

Any other suggestions for overripe bananas?

Beef Bourginon and No Knead Bread

Full disclosure: I made this way too long ago, but never got around to fully blogging it.  On what was supposed to be a semi-cold and rainy day but actually turned out to be an unseasonably warm one, I decided to make one of the dishes everyone says you need to try with a dutch oven - Beef Bourginon.

For Valentine's Day this year, Nick gave me "Williams Sonoma Cooking at Home" by Chuck Williams, which is supposed to be our generation's "Joy of Cooking."  Unlike most Williams Sonoma cookbooks this one does not have any photos.  Instead, it's just packed full of good stuff, including all sorts of helpful tips for every type of chef. 

The Necessities...

1/2 lb. of salt pork (diced)
Olive oil as needed
8 Shallots (minced)
2 yellow onions (finely diced)
2 carrots peeled  (finely diced)
2 garlic cloves (minced)
about 2 cups all-purpose flour
salt, ground pepper and nutmeg
3 lbs well-marbled beef chuck (2" cubed)
1/4 cup cognac
2 cups beef broth
2 fresh thyme sprigs
3 cups dry red wine
1 bay leaf
5 tbls. unsalted butter
18-24 pearl onions (peeled)
2 tbls. sugar
1 lb white or cremini mushrooms (I used a mixture)
Chopped flat-leaf parsley

As always, to start I took the initial ingredients...

and chopped them all up.

Having never used salt pork before I was cautiously optimistic.  I had heard that you could use bacon in place of it but since I easily found the salt pork at Whole Foods, I went for it.  I sauteed the salt pork in a pan for 8-10 minutes and, using a slotted spoon, removed the cubes from the pan and saved for later.  At that point, I added the carrots, onions, shallots, carrots and garlic to the pan and cooked them up for 10 minutes.

Sauteing veggies

Once the veggies were nice and tender I moved them from the pan to the dutch oven. 

Veggies ready and waiting

Meanwhile, on a large plate I mixed up the flour, salt, pepper and nutmeg and coated the cubed beef, shook off the excess flour and then cooked the meat in an oiled pan, adding additional oil to the pan as needed.

Flouring the beef

The tip here is to cook the meat in batches (making sure not to overcrowd the pan).  I cooked the beef cubes until they were just browned on all sides. 

Browning beef cubes

Once the cubes were cooked, they were added to the dutch oven as well.

Next group of ingredients

With the meat now in the dutch oven, I deglazed the saute pan with cognac and a little beef broth, scraping up all the brown bits.

Deglazing

Once the base of this sauce came together, it joined the other cooked ingredients in the dutch oven along with the remaining beef broth, thyme, bay leaf, and wine.

Ready to cook away

With everything combined, the dutch oven went into a 325 degree oven for 3 hours until the beef was tender.

About an hour before the contents of the dutch oven were finished cooking, I went ahead and finished the rest of the bourginon.

Pearl Onions

In a frying pan over medium heat, I melted two tablespoons of butter and added the pearl onions so that they were in a single layer.  The recipe called for fresh raw pearl onions, and while I was trying to stick as close to the recipe as possible, frozen onions were just way easier (Peeling all those tiny onions?  No, thank you.)  Since the onions are already cooked when they're frozen, they cooked on the stove for less than 10 minutes.  I added a half cup of beef broth while the onions were cooking, and when they were done, I transfered them to a bowl and set it aside.

In the same pan, I melted the remaining butter and added the mushrooms.

Mushrooms (my fav)!

I cooked the mushrooms for about five minutes, until tender.  Once this was all done and there was a half hour left for the bourginon to cook, I added the mushrooms and pearl onions to the dutch oven.

30 minutes passed and I pulled the pot out of the oven, removing the bay leaf and the thyme.

So ready!

Finally, I added back the salt pork and chopped up the parsley for garnish.

And, ta-da!!

The beef bourginon was delicious!  The flavors fully developed and you really could taste each of the components - it all worked together so well.  As you can see, this recipe definitely took some time but was well worth it.  Since it turned out to be a very warm day, having the oven on for so long definitely overheated the apartment, but the dish was so yummy that I couldn't really complain.  Next time I would use the salt pork in the beginning but not add it back in, the texture wasn't my favorite.

The bread in the photo is actually homemade and so worth it.  The best part: no kneading required!  A while ago, my co- worker brought in bread she made from "My Bread: Revolutionary No Work, No Knead Bread" by Jim Lahey that was so good, I bought the book immediately.  The recipe takes requires a lot of sitting time, so since we knew we'd be attempting the beef bourginon, we got started the night before.

The Necessities...

3 cups bread flour
1 1/4 tsp table salt
1/4 tsp instant or active dry yeast
1 1/3 cups cool water
Additional wheat bran, cornmeal or additional flour

In a glass bowl I mixed the bread flour, salt and yeast.

Dry Ingredients

I added the water to the dry ingredients and with a wooden spoon mixed it all together until I got a sticky dough (about 30 seconds)

Sticky mess

If it does not seem sticky enough, go ahead and add another tablespoon or two of water.  I covered the bowl with a tea towel and let it sit until the dough doubled in size, which takes anywhere between 12-18 hours.  The longer it can sit, the better - this is where it all ferments.

The next day, I generously dusted my counter with flour (I have granite, but a wooden or plastic cutting board would also work) and scrapped the dough onto the surface in one piece. 

Ready to work

The dough will be stringy and sticky, but do not add more flour.  Using my lightly floured hands I lifted the edges of the dough toward the center, nudging and tucking in the edges of the dough to make it round. 

Finally, I placed a cotton or linen tea towel (not terry) on the work surface and generously dusted it with the flour (you can use cornmeal or wheat bran here, but since we always have flour on hand, I went with that) and then gently lifted the dough ball onto the towel so the seam side was down.  If the dough is tacky, you can dust the top with a bit more flour.  I folded the ends of the towel loosely over the dough and let it sit for another 1 or 2 hours until, again, it had doubled in size.

Wrapped up and sitting

Half an hour before the end of the second rise, I preheated the oven to 475 degrees with the rack in the lower third position and put the dutch oven in to heat up.  Once heated, I removed the dutch oven from the oven, uncovered the dough ball, lightly dusted it and plopped it into the pot.

The lid went back on baked for 30 minutes, then baked for another 30 minutes uncovered.

So ready to eat

The verdict?  Delicious!  This comes out looking (and smelling) like something out of one of the little Italian bakeries in the North End.  We've made this bread a dozen times and have always had the same great results.  We even keep plenty of yeast and bread flour on hand now so that we can make a loaf of bread whenever we want.  So far we've only attempted the basic bread recipe, but you can make lots of variations.  Nick's former coworker has made this a bunch of times with whatever was on hand - leftover herbs, olives, sun-dried tomatoes, etc.  The book even has a recipe for chocolate coconut bread, which, as I'm sure you can guess, is on my list to try!

Overall, these were two winning recipes!